Eldar Gogoladze, who was in charge of the bodyguards of President Eduard Shevardnadze of Georgia, was suspended pending an inquiry into the killing on Sunday of a US diplomat near Tbilisi, AFP reports from Moscow.

Mr Gogoladze was in a jeep with Fred Woodruff, the regional-affairs officer in the political section of the US embassy in Tbilisi, when Mr Woodruff was shot once in the head and killed. Preliminary indications showed the shot was fired from within the vehicle.

A Georgian official said earlier that the two men were accompanied by two women and that Mr Gogoladze was inebriated. He added that he was 'known for his excesses' when drunk.